Suggested by the tolling of the bell on the sash factory in Port
Deposit on a stormy night in January, 1856.
The rain is the loudest and wildest
Of rains that ever fell;
And the winds like an army of chanters
Through the desolate pine-woods swell,
And hark! through the shout of the tempest,
The sound of the midnight bell.
Now close on the storm it rises,
Now sadly it sinks with a moan--
Like a human heart in its anguish,
Crushing a fruitless groan--
Like a soul that goes wailing and pining,
Thro' the motherless world, alone.
Is it hung in an ancient turret?
Is it swung by a mortal hand?
Is it chiming in woe or gladness,
Its symphonies sweet and grand?
Is it rung for a shadowy sorrow,
In the shadowy phantom land?
Alas for the beautiful guesses
That live in a poet's rhyme--
'Tis only the bell of the factory
Tolling its woe sublime;
And the wind is the ghostly ringer,
Ringing the midnight chime.
Toll, mournful bell of the tempest,
Through my dreams by sleep unblest;
My bosom is throbbing as madly
To surges of wild unrest--
E'en as thy heart of iron
Is beating thy brazen breast!